B Lab U.S. & Canada Presents the 2020 B Community Award Recipients

Recognizing the Bright Examples of Leadership This Year

While 2020 was a challenging year in many respects, businesses in the community of Certified B Corporations leaned into their purpose and mission to use business as a force for good. From pivoting business models to provide PPE or meals to those in need, to restructuring office policies to allow for flex scheduling and remote work, to providing education and training on anti-racism, many B Corps and B Corp leaders have stepped up to meet the moment.

B Lab U.S. & Canada is proud to recognize this year’s recipients of its annual community awards, which recognize the people and companies that have gone above and beyond to make a positive difference. Each award was presented by a B Lab U.S. & Canada team member, and some of their comments along with information about this year’s honorees are shared below.

Congratulations to this year’s award recipients, and the entire B Corp community, for leading with purpose and continually striving to build an inclusive, regenerative economy that works for everyone.

Hal Taussig Award: Dr. Tiffany Jana, TMI Consulting

The Hal Taussig Award is given annually to the individual who most embodies the aspirational ideals of the B Corp community. This award is named after Hal Taussig, a founder of Untours, which was an inspiration to B Lab’s co-founders in creating B Corps and became the first B Corp. This year, the Hal Taussig Award recipient was Dr. Tiffany Jana, the founder and CEO of TMI Consulting, the world’s first B Corp with a diversity engagement focus. Dr. Jana is co-author of the B Corp Handbook and Overcoming Bias, and author of other books.

Ben Anderson, co-CEO of B Lab U.S. & Canada, said of Dr. Jana: “While honoring our trailblazing nature, what I want to do is honor that you are a trailblazer among trailblazers and you have created a path for us to follow. You consistently showed up in that trailblazing mode and helped us to see that we don’t need to have fear to be ourselves and live our values.”

Movement Builder Award: Business Development Bank of Canada; Florida for Good; Good for Michigan

The Movement Builder Award recognizes individuals and organizations who have made an extra-special contribution to the growth of the B Corp community over the last year. This year, the honorees are the Business Development Bank of Canada, Florida for Good, and Good for Michigan.

Strategic Partnerships Manager for B Lab U.S. & Canada Christopher Alan Nickelson said: “They’ve all contributed in their own unique ways, but some throughlines have been that they’ve run impact measurement programs for companies of all stages; been early adopters of new impact tools and initiatives, like the SDG Action Manager; and they’ve championed pure collaboration in their local communities. Their contributions have been so instrumental in cultivating B Corp networks in places all across the United States and Canada.”

Policy Champion Award: Glenn Schiffbauer, executive director of Santa Fe Green Chamber of Commerce

The Policy Champion Award recognizes the individuals who have helped advance policy initiatives to support the adoption of benefit corporation governance. This year’s honoree, Glenn Schiffbauer, executive director of Santa Fe Green Chamber of Commerce, helped pass benefit corporation legislation this year in New Mexico after a multi-year effort on this front.

Holly Ensign-Bartsow, director of stakeholder governance and policy at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said of Schiffbauer: “This year’s awardee has been working to pass benefit corporation legislation in his state since before I joined B Lab, way back in 2012. He’s dealt with an insane number of roadblocks, from a veto by the governor, to opposition from state senators, to countless back and forths with legislative counsel, to the Trial Lawyers Association. And throughout all of that, he has steered the legislation, he has kept hope alive and managed through political minefields and finally, this year, he passed the legislation.”

Collective Voice Award: Chris Marquis

The Collective Voice Award recognizes the individual or the organization that has most helped spread the word about the B Corp movement. This year, Chris Marquis, the Samuel C. Johnson Professor in Sustainable Global Enterprise at Cornell University, earned the award because of his multiple public engagements centered around B Corps, including the release of his book, Better Business: How the B Corp Movement Is Remaking Capitalism, and his various speaking engagements, articles and op-eds, and other interviews and presentations.

Becca Quirk, community engagement manager at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said: “Importantly, he is also well-entrenched within academia and helped really steward B Corp awareness for a new generation of leaders who are trying to create impactful business models. He’s doing this in a very pivotal moment for the B Corp movement, which we can all sense. There’s starting to be much greater recognition, and his writings… are invaluable to the movement.”

Collective Impact Award: WeTheChange

The Collective Impact Award is given to an individual or an organization that spearheaded the most significant collective impact effort. This year, the award was given to the leaders and the learners of WeTheChange, with a special callout to members of the WeTheChange political advocacy group. WeTheChange is a group of womxn-identifying leaders of B Corps and other purpose-driven enterprises who are committed to creating a radically inclusive and regenerative global economy.

Kim Coupounas, global ambassador at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said: “One of the amazing ways they really leaned into their vision this year was through a highly timely and relevant effort that was focused on getting out the vote and crushing voter suppression during the most pivotal U.S. election of our lifetimes. They sent more than 18,000 postcards to get out the vote, wrote emails to the secretaries of states and their respective top election officials, as well as members of Congress, calling for election integrity. They’re also currently engaged and Get Out the Vote for the Georgia runoff. Their educational and catalytic webinars drew hundreds of attendees from our community and beyond and created large ripples that have inspired others across the social impact business community.”

Climate Action Award: Habitus

This year, B Lab awarded its inaugural Climate Action Award, which recognizes an individual or organization that went above and beyond to support climate efforts in the B Corp community. The 2020 honoree is Habitus for the company’s facilitation that galvanized the B Corp Climate Collective at the first and second B Corp Climate Leadership Summits and, as Coupounas said: “the painstaking thoroughness, and preparation, persistence, and vision that it took to bring divergent voices forward, to reach unifying and meaningful outcomes and vision and then the thoughtful work to keep gluing these leaders and learners together in the months that followed. Because of their unique combination of brilliance and work ethic, this honoree has been instrumental in the global mobilization of B Corps to address the climate emergency. This is a team that consistently goes above and beyond in their engagements because they are fundamentally committed to excellence and to making a difference in the world.”

COVID-19 Impact Award: Revolution Foods

The COVID-19 Impact Award, a unique spotlight, recognizes the B Corp that went above and beyond to support workers and/or pivot their production and to support communities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Revolution Foods, the recipient of this award, has innovated with its business model to support those most impacted by the pandemic. Since the beginning of the pandemic, Revolution Foods has served more than 34 million meals to people in need across the country. The company has continued its work through the holidays with a partnership with the Feeding Good Project (which anyone can donate to for the holidays at this link).

Kara Peck, senior director of growth and partnerships at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said: “At the start of the pandemic, Revolution Foods quickly pivoted its model to providing high-quality, healthy food for schools to dramatically expand their service. The company partnered with schools, city officials, community-based organizations, nonprofit leaders, and more to develop and distribute multi-day meal boxes to ensure that not only those who had previously qualified for food assistance were able to receive the meals, but that the box services were able to provide a healthy meal to really anyone in need. This includes not only school children, but also food-insecure individuals at senior centers, homeless shelters, and more.”

Anti-Racism and JEDI Impact Award: Raj Aggarwal, Provoc

The Anti-Racism and JEDI Impact Award is given to the person or organization that has gone above and beyond to lead and support JEDI (Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion) and anti-racism efforts. This year’s honoree — Raj Aggarwal, president and lead strategist of Provoc — has advanced JEDI initiatives throughout the B Corp community, within B Lab itself, and in leading the Climate Justice Task Force.

B Lab U.S. & Canada Growth Catalyst Andy Fyfe said: “This person, as we all know, is always positive, always kind, always real, hardworking, and truly a visionary. He has invested countless hours interviewing B Corps around the world this fall, and working with partners to write the first ever Climate Justice Playbook for businesses to be released in January 2021. He’s making an enormous impact on our movements. And, to quote one of my colleagues, ‘The type of impact that Raj and Vanice [Dunn] have on an individual level is to force deeper introspection and, as a result, unlock potential one never knew was there.’”

Community Builder Awards: Carolina Miranda of Cultivating Capital and Nathan Stuck of Ad Victoriam Solutions

The Community Builder Award is a new award that recognizes community members who stand out in creating connectivity and belonging within the B Corp community. This year, the honor was awarded to two recipients: Carolina Miranda, CEO of Cultivating Capital, and Nathan Stuck, director of corporate culture at Ad Victoriam Solutions.

Sylvia Laserna, a community innovation & engagement strategist at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said: “Carolina is an active participant and organizer of B Local Bay Area. She’s part of WeTheChange, she’s in the Climate Collective, and she’s part of the Dismantle Collective. She has also helped several B Corps certify and re-certify. Nathan is the co-founder and active participant of B Local Georgia, one of the main organizers and chair of the BLD Southeast, and an avid B Hive supporter. Please join me in celebrating them!”

Community Resilience Award: Fors Marsh Group

The Community Resilience Award, which recognizes the B Corp that has supported the resilience of B Corps and B Lab U.S. & Canada through fostering business value for the movement, was awarded this year to the Fors Marsh Group. This company and its leaders have demonstrated deep commitment, partnership, and consistent pro bono support to increase the value of the B Corp network.

Andrew Kahan, community engagement manager at B Lab U.S. & Canada, said: “A few examples of Fors Marsh in action: Their stewardship of collective purchasing amongst B Corps; piloting B Healthy, a health care collective for B Corps; helping B Lab pull critical community data on B Corps’ community satisfaction and brand awareness; and their guidance and support on the B Marketplace, which launched today on the B Hive. On a personal note, having worked closely with them to grow this partnership, I’m deeply grateful for the way the entire team lives into the B Corp values and shows up as helpful and humble, and is really a true pleasure to work with and build with.”